If the Democrats couldn't eek out an electoral win in 2000 or 2016, the GOP won't have a chance in 2024 after two terms of Trump.
Good point. With such charismatic figures as Al Gore and Hillary Clinton, how could they lose?
Honestly, if they run DeSantis with someone like Joni Ernst, they'd have a solid chance of pulling it off. Or Haley, I guess, though Ernst would make a stronger VP
Gore had a good economy and peace abroad, Clinton in 2016 could at least say the economy was better than it was in 2008 and even 2012 and while the situation abroad in 2016 wasn't ideal, it hadn't gotten worse that it was when Obama took office. If the GOP after two terms of Trump doesn't have that in 2024 and a Dukakis level weak Democratic nominee to run against, they'll lose.
Pretty much. And it wasn't just that. HW was much more moderate than Reagan despite being more or less cut from the same cloth. What would a socially and fiscally moderate yet culturally conservative Republican look like (the entire Sanchez spiel about being pro-life but not wanting abortion to be illegal, being OK to a point with more wealth redistribution but really wants immigration PERIOD to be stopped and there to be fewer limits about how police catch criminals and solve crimes) besides how Trump himself was sold by moderate European Trump trolls to Atlas in October 2016?
So you really need 3 things-
1) Someone like Trump who at least appears to be more moderate in BOTH temperament and policy
2) A "technocratic" Democratic opponent to take indefensible stances on culture war issues
3) At least a 2016 situation where we are better off than we were 8 years ago or a 2000 situation where 60% of the country is OK with what is going on.
You could say that in 2000 and 2016, Republicans won because they avoided issue 2 by running a populist who could appear to be very conservative and yet in the middle at the same time which made them both hard to attack and left the incumbent party open to unconventional attack vectors.
You could even say that Dukakis ran a great campaign by improving 12 points against Mondale but that voters just weren't ready.
That's another interesting observation- when was the last time a party won a 3rd term when they didn't win the first or second by more than 10% of PV?
